By virtue of such features as light weight, small thickness and low power consumption, liquid crystal display devices have been used in various fields as display devices of OA equipment, such as personal computers, and TVs. In recent years, liquid crystal display devices have also been used as display devices of portable terminal equipment such as mobile phones, car navigation apparatuses, amusement devices, etc.
Of such liquid crystal display devices, a liquid crystal display device, which is configured to include an illumination unit (i.e. backlight) on a back side of a liquid crystal display panel, is required to have a higher brightness and a higher display quality. In recent years, as the illumination unit mounted in the liquid crystal display device, there has been proposed an illumination unit having such a directivity that light can be emitted in at least two directions.